Hickey Talk

I wasn't sure how to start this but I think it would be good to start how he commented how some people like money better than art and vice-versa. He is a funny old English teacher and was entertaining the whole time which I believe is important. So..

He also pokes fun at people who get into art for the money and jokes that there is no point in having money if your not doing drugs. Ha Ha. Naughty humor but looking at it history he definitely shuns out those who surround and associate art with wealth.

He talks about his friend who he says and what his friend says is an "Art Dealer." Quotes intended because he explains that his friend gets a piece, puts a ridiculous price on it and ships it off. He goes on to say that this isn't really dealing art at all. This struck me as accurate to some, including mine's opinion that art is just so overpriced for certain reasons unbecoming of other pieces and artists. This leads into him saying a little while after, "If you have this many buckets full of money and you want to piss a lot of it away.. get into the art world."

When he talks about commercial art vs. non-commercial art. Not really sure where he was going with it, but he claims that this non-commercial art is beneficial to the museums and the economy. Which makes somewhat sense when he claims that when the business class people buy the less wanted art then it spreads a nice money flow through it.

I like when he brings up the analogy of the hotel art exhibit vs. this Baghdad hotel black market like thing. Where it is in each room you can buy, what he calls "stolen shit." This is an interesting thought and comparison and he really must favor that since he believes many art pieces nowadays are similar to what those people were selling.. that is if I am interpreting this correctly.

Frieze Art Unveiling

One of the installation exhibits we have seen and talked about in class as of late is the Frieze Art Fair. This is a big to do in England and October 2009 was an exquisite one. Looking through the pictures from the exhibit I cam across this one, which particularly caught my eye:



Going back a ways we discussed how art just cannot be fully appreciated and is not the same at all looking at it 2-dimensionally. Which I have done here and what most people who don't get to shows do, ie. looking at them digitally.

There were many pieces such as this one in the show but this one had people surrounding it and even one or two standing in front of them. Speaking on the thought of not being able to fully appreciate the piece looking at it online, I believe I still somewhat. This snapshot really shows how hard lined and dark the lining is on the piece. It has to be one of the most, real-time cartoon looking piece I have ever come across. What I mean by that it is in real life but is a cartoon cut-out of some sort and looks exactly like it would as if you were watching a high quality, old school cartoon.

This might not make too much sense but it still is just amazing how you can create such a conflicting concept in our physical realm. It looks as though this picture is fake and that figure is a fake inserted in a designing program. It most definitely is not and makes me appreciate it that much more.

Dave Hickey from the University of Nevada in Las Vegas gave a lecture called “Custodians of culture- Schoolyard Art: Playing Fair Without the Referee”. The lecture was mainly about selling without selling out focusing on how sites of commerce have evolved from the white cube to the art fair. Hickey begins his lecture by describing Dr. J, a guy who wanted to play professional basketball and always played by the rules, even if he was playing street ball. On the other hand, in the art world, Hickey said “whatever rules there were, there ain’t”. in today’s world, artists like money more than they like art. The act of honorability does not exist in the art world anymore. Hickey argues that if you behave well, if you behave right, all you can lose is money. To be honest, that’s all you can lose by being right, by being correct and by making art that might last you 100 years.

Hickey questions why people would want art that they don’t really like. Hickey quotes Leo by saying, “you can’t be right all the time, but you can never be wrong”, which means that if you create art for yourself and if you buy art because you like it, there is nothing wrong with that. What is wrong is selling art for too much money. Hickey claims that institutions suck all the money. The whole format of the art world changed since the 1970’s. You had artists in their studios who took their work to art galleries, where members of the community would buy what they liked. If community members bought the art it meant it had virtue, and it represented icons of public significance. The sequences of art reaching a museum was artist, dealer, community, and lastly museum. It reached the museum depending on the interest of the community.

Dave Hickey then discusses the idea of a price point. Leo Catelli is an example of a price point; he did not compromise his art. Price point people are never wrong, but who can give you a price point now, who makes a profession out of never being wrong. The answer to this is no one because this world does not exist in art anymore. In institutional installation markets nothing changes because nothing is driving a change and he claims that we don’t care. We don’t have style development anymore because history is over. 9/11 marked the death of post modernism. Hickey loves it when people buy art, but he will only show art he likes. He even likes art that he feels is 99% bullshit and 1% interesting because that 1% is all he needs.

Hickeys wife commented on a recent movie that they just saw claiming that she liked it because it had good values. Dave Hickey questions if value will ever return to the art world. He feels that it could be coming back and that people might start to buy again what they like, not what costs the most. I hope that good value will be reentered into the art world because art is a form of expression and should be created and bought because it expresses ones interest.

Art in Context: Fred Wilson

One conceptual artist who caught my attention in class was Fred Wilson. He was born in the Bronx and described himself as of Africa, Native American, European and Amerindian decent. This relates to his work because he feels that everyone is related and connected as he portrays in some of his pieces.

A quote that he said that I found compelling was, “when you start doing what you really believe in, that’s when you start to do your best work”. After Wilson receives a BFA from Suny Purchase in 1976, where he was the only black student, he said that he longer had the desire to make things with his hands. He said, “I get everything that satisfies my soul,” he says, “from bringing together objects that are in the world, manipulating them, working with spatial arrangements, and having things presented in the way I want to see them.” Fred Wilson has a distinctive and talented way of looking at objects and creating art out of them.

Wilson examines, questions, and deconstructs the traditional display of art and artifacts in museums. He uses new wall labels, sounds, lighting, and non-traditional pairings of objects, to lead viewers to recognize that changes in context create changes in meaning. One example of his work is, for his installation at the 2003 Venice Biennale he employed a tourist to pretend to be an African street vendor selling fake designer bags - in fact his own designs. He also incorporated “blackamoors”, sculptures of black people in the role of servants, into the show. Such figures were often used as stands for lights. Wilson placed his wooden blackamoors carrying acetylene torches and fire extinguishers. He noted that such figures are so common in Venice that few people notice them, stating, "they are in hotels everywhere in Venice...which is great, because all of a sudden you see them everywhere. I wanted it to be visible, this whole world which sort of just blew up for me." Overall, Wilson’s unique vision of art produces installations and art that is very appealing.

‘I Shop Therefore I Am’- Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger is a conceptual artist who has had several exhibitions in galleries such as; Mary Boone Gallery in New York, Yvon Lambert Gallery in Paris, and Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, Whitney Museum in New York, Rhona Hoffman Gallery in Chicago and the Tate Gallery in London. Kruger's words and pictures have been displayed in both galleries and public spaces. They have also been framed and unframed photographs, posters, postcards, t-shirts, electronic signboards, billboards and on a train station platform in Strasbourg, France. Kruger has created installations of video, film, audio and projection as well. Her work focuses on consistently about the kindnesses and brutalities of social life: about how we are to one another.

Her graphic work is mainly black and white photographs with overlaid captions set in white on a red poster. The phrases that she uses in her work are declarative, and she makes common use of pronouns such as; "you", "your", "I", "we", and "they". The combination of imagery and text containing criticism of sexism and the circulation of power within cultures is a recurring pattern in Kruger's work. The text in her works of the 1980s includes such phrases as "Your comfort is my silence" (1981), "You invest in the divinity of the masterpiece" (1982), and "I shop therefore I am" (1987). Kruger claims that she “works with pictures and words because they have the ability to determine who we are and who we aren’t." Her later re-photography uses a kind of appropriation as its own focus, pulling from the works of others and the words they depict to create her own. Her focus was to fuse broad cultural images as a whole and place them toward narrower signs of personal interpretation.

Kruger's piece, ‘I shop therefore I am’, focuses on the world as a consumer culture. For some people, shopping has turned into a lifestyle consuming at our leisure. Some feel that, the power of consumption is stopping us from finding true and sincere happiness; and that shopping often works as a substitute for something that we’re missing in life. Consumer culture has a strong power over the people. The focus is about what we buy and what we choose to invest in, the world we live in will be the result of these choices. I feel that this is the message that Barbara Kruger was trying to portray through her art.

Das Undbild by Kurt Schwitters

Continuing our discussions with appropriation art I came across this piece shown above. It is a collage painting, like a lot of appropriated art and was conceived in 1919. Like the starting with my other posts, I started thinking about the title of the piece. It seems to be some German thing.. "Das".. maybe. "Undbild" stumps me as well. Could be something like, "not building" or something similar. Since it is a collage, it is composed of fragmented images or pieces somewhat not familiar with each other.

I believe this piece was also tagged or put under the style of movement of DaDa as well. When looking at this movement.. as I think I have posted about before, it is very unique. Well, most movements are but it is just so abstract and just.. strange in its conception and use of its mediums. Its mediums being very random things, some highly political and strange use of characters and "serial murderer" type collage pieces. This piece is not so much like the more in-depth Dada but it definitely reminds me of it.

This collage is considered to be appropriation art because.. well it has recycled and adopted or sample aspects of other objects. I guess you could say most, if not all collage art is appropriate but these is definitely something going on here besides just a diarrhea of images thrown on a canvas. Coming back full circle to the title. Simply searching what others have to say on the internet spat back a bunch of thoughts and some nonsense. But filtering the good ones, it is indeed German and I came up with The deconstruction or just simply "and build." Whatever the case may be it has to do with some building of or deconstruction. Of what exactly.. not so easy to filter out.

Damien Hirst Separates Himself From The Artists Community

In class we discussed Appropriating Art and how it is community spirited meaning that the artists don’t mind other artists taking their art and portray it using a new medium or differently. However, Damien Hirst does not have this mindset, threatening to sue a 16-year-old who takes time off his school work to create urban designs of cultural icons, which he sells for £65. Damien Hirst is suing Cartain because he incorporating his diamond encrusted skull, For the Love of God, into his graffiti prints. Not only is Hirst suing him but he is also demanding the teenager to give him the £200 he made from selling these images. This is ridiculous of Hirst when he made £200 million from his diamond-encrusted skull and pickled shark.

Some of Cartain’s work is displayed on the backstreets of London’s Brick Lane and Old Street. He has done other collages incorporating the Queen and George Bush as well. Some of the collages he did with the encrusted skull imposed the skull over faces or figures from other photographs. One displayed the skull next to a bag of carrots in a grocery cart. According to The Independent, what Cartain did was that ‘he made a series of collages using photographs of Hirst’s skull, some of which imposed the bejeweled sculpture over the faces of figures taken from other photographs. One showed the skull in a shopping basket alongside some carrots. The images were displayed in the online gallery, 100artworks.com, where Cartain’s collages sell for £65, on average’. This is seen as ironic because, ‘three weeks after the artist unveiled the £50m sculpture, another artist, John LeKay, claimed he had been producing similar jewel-encrusted skulls since 1993’.

In revenge for Hirst forcing him to stop selling his collages, Cartain sent threats to his gallery and faced a possible jail sentence because he took a ‘box of pencils from a Hirst installation as a prank and offered to return them only if Hirst would let him go back to displaying and selling his art’. The Faber Castell Mongol 482s from 1990, box of pencils is supposedly worth GBP 500,000, making this one of the largest modern art thefts in British history. Some argue that the stunt was to gain publicity, which I feel was part of his revenge. Overall, if Hirst did not make such a big deal over Cartain’s art, this big ordeal would not have happened and I feel that this portrayed Hirst negatively to the rest of the art community.

Illusions of Dangerous Reality by Li Wei

While exploring some more recent performance artists or art in general, I came across a most interesting one. Li Wei's art is a most captivating and wild notion of a way to express the dangerous actions human beings could encounter.. or something of the like. Such as :



They don't seem to have any titles labeled to them, but to be honest do they? This is hard to look at without feeling a certain concern for the guy "hanging" outside the building, as seen with others reaching out to him. While I read the article, Wei answers a few questions for the interviewer and it is done with very precise, safe and useful wires as to show these pieces as real as possible.



The above picture shows a kind of drowning scene where the guy is face deep in water but floating their upside down. Now I'm sure some sort of tension rod is above the picture with a wire there but this is extreme to say the least. There doesn't seem to be faking of him actually being underwater. Which brings me to the point of, even though they have wires etc these people or guy are really over that roof and under that water. This artist really does go to the extreme and it is so different to me, even after witnessing many different types and many different artists. It is a showmanship of the thoughts and maybe nightmares of people brought into reality and put right in your lap.

One performance and installation artist who focuses on the scenery and other people rather than himself is Spencer Tunick. Tunick was born January 1, 1967 and is best known for his installations featuring large numbers of nude people posed in artistic formations situated in urban famous landmarks all over the world. He has also done some work outside the mainstream city area in woodland and beaches along with individuals and small groups. One thing that I did not know was that he is the subject of three documentaries on HBO, Naked States, naked World, and Positively Naked. The people who become the art are all volunteers whom in return receive a limited edition photo. This raises the question of the type of people who would voluntarily poses naked along with hundreds or thousands of other people for the world to see. However, when one looks at Tunick’s work, the art does not focus on the individuals, rather the new picture that these nudes create. His artwork does not judge the individuals appearance because it is not about specific individuals, rather a larger group and free in a scene left for interpretation.

His early work started when he was in London. He took a picture of a nude at a bus stop. In 1992, Tunick began documenting live nudes in public locations such as New York focusing on individuals or small groups. These works were more intimate than the large scale pieces that he currently known for. His work grew and by 1994 he had organized 65 site related installations in international major cities such as, Cork, Dublin, London, Melbourne, Rome, Sydney, San Sebastian and Amsterdam. In 2003, Spencer Tunick photographed 7,000 nudes in Barcelona and in 2007, completed his largest installation of 18,000 in Mexico City. Tunick photographs these people is different positions such as standing up, lying down, and on their knees. Tunick had to time his photographs right because he had to work with the landscape and the different lighting and sun glare that occurred.

One installation that I find interesting is the one on the Aletsch Glacier on August 18, 2007 where he uses 600 nude people to create a living sculpture intended to draw attention to global warming and the shrinking of the world’s glaciers. The temperature was about 10 degrees Celsius and he followed with an installation in Miami Beach in October. His lasts work was on March 1, 2010 at the Sydney Opera House in Australia. This was his first large sale installation in Sydney and was carried out as part of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. Spencer Tunick stated, "A body is a living entity. It represents life, freedom, sensuality, and it is a mechanism to carry out our thoughts. A body is always beautiful to me. It depends on the individual work and what I do with it and what kind of idea lies behind it — if age matters or not. But in my group works, the only difference is how far people can go if it rains, snows etc.” I think that Tunick is an artist who is unique and has a mind that captures beauty with creative meaning behind it.

Today in class we were introduced to performance art. It is different than the previous art we have studied because paintings, sculptures or instillations, focus on the object as the main idea of the art. In performance art time, space, the performer’s body and a relationship between performer and audience are essential. There is no set space, or length of time, rather it is completely personal and what the performer feels. Performance art is very emotional as I learned from Marina Abramovic.

After watching her biography in class and reading more about her performance art, I have realized that there is not always a strong connection between the audience and performer. Some night find her work magnificent or appealing, however, I am more allured by other types of art. I do have a respect for her art though. She is constantly pushing the boundaries with her art and limits of her body and possibilities of the mind. Abramovic’s performances are all very personal and makes her the main focus of the piece. She claims that there is a right time and place for her performance and that she usually begins or ends on the night of a full moon. She claims that she does not want to waste the energy of the moon showing her thought and connection to the world. Abramovic has no limits to her art and a purity of expression.

Her performances all explore the physical and metal limitations of the body and mind. In her Rhythm 10, 1973 performance she played the Russian game in which rhythmic knife jabs are aimed between the spread fingers. Each time that Marina Abramovic cut herself she would pick up a new knife from the row of twenty she had set up, and recorded the operation. She recorded this and after cutting herself twenty times went over the recordings listening to the sounds and trying to correct her mistakes. She listened to her pain and the sounds of the stabbing on the recording proving her feeling that once you enter into a performance you can push your body to do things you absolutely never do normally. This belief is shown to a greater extent in her performance where for twelve days she lived in the museum. She had ladders set up with knifes as the prongs preventing her from leaving the raised three rooms. She showered there claiming it purified her and wondered if that purity could be spread to the whole room. She also only drank water, no food for twelve days testing her body and seeing how he deprived mind would function. She has also done make other performances that tested her physically such as taking depressant drugs and other harmful acts. She is able to enter into the structure giving the audience a unique and personal performance.

On & Off by Aakash Nihalani

The more and more we look at installation pieces the more I begin to like and appreciate them. Since more of them made, or put on or near public places it makes me think that they are for the public. For them to enjoy and for the art to be out in the world and not just in a gallery but then the world or two would be the gallery wouldn't it?

Whether it be the government, state, city, town or just the surrounding public installation pieces are installed for pleasure of passing by folks. People could be walking near or even on top of some pieces. This is the case for Aakash Nihalani's piece On and Off. People are actually walking on top of the piece just like a certain cracked floor in a gallery.

This piece is made with tape, and colorful tape at that. It reminds me of Michael Craig Martin's style and what he does with his pieces. Not only are they hard-lined but also very colorful, Martin's specialty.
When I first looked at the piece I thought that the piece was of two sets of two buildings. But I wasn't so sure after reading the name again.

Then the explanation that I now like is that it is because people walk on the piece and then off. This is just like the regular cross walk set up with very think white lines. That really isn't art but in this piece it gives it a twist. Not only are people walking on the piece. They are walking on top of the piece. The parts of the piece closer to us give it 3-dimensions and make it look like you are stepping up onto a platform. This is very simple but at the same time very clever. Just for the everyday public, walking to their destination.

Accumulation As An Art Form

I am fascinated by Song Dong’s “Waste Not” instillation. The instillation can be viewed from both the first floor and an aerial view from the second floor looking down on the instillation. The Modern Museum of Modern Art is where his life as art instillation is displayed. For around forty years, Song Dong’s mother held onto birdcages, shopping bags, bottle caps, jump ropes, tooth paste tubes, mittens and bowls in her small wooden house in Beijing. With the unexpected and tragic death of Song’s father in 2002, Song’s mother collected everything as if in a way the stuff could help her with the grief. Song convinced his mother to help him order the chaos into a more organized collection. This collection signified deprivation, attachment, evanescence, and loss for Song and his mother.
I think the instillation is both unique and emotional. The view from above helps the viewers see the organization and order of all the materials that were collected. The fact that Song made the chaos into a well organized and eye appealing instillation makes it not only art but art in a new form. He was able to tell his life story based on the items that are portrayed in the instillation and have meaning behind it. It is mind-blowing to see how much stuff one can accumulate throughout their life if they do not throw out any of the unnecessary objects. The instillation tells the story of a typical life of a Chinese woman however has an emotional connection with Song and his mother after his father’s death.
Song shows that hoarding, which can sometimes be seen as a disorder, can sometimes be a beautiful thing. This collection included everything from takeout boxes to soda cans. This instillation not makes art out of the little things we take for granted and often disregard, but also shows the struggle with the loss of Song’s father. Above his instillation there is a neon sign saying “Dad, don’t worry. Mum and we are fine.” This sign signifies the emotion behind the art and I feel that it is neon so that it stands out so that the viewers can sympathize with his loss. I feel Song made this instillation for his mother and wants people to feel the emotion involved in creating the organized chaos instillation.

"Buckets of Rain"-Judy Pfaff

One artist whom I found intriguing it Judy Pfaff. Her instillation art, especially “Buckets of Rain” were very fascinating and brilliantly designed. After learning some more about “Buckets of Rain”, I realized that the instillation had an emotional tie to the loss of her art teacher at Yale, Al Held and her mother. Both Dr. Held and her mother’s loss were a big deal to her and impacted her instillation.

Pfaff also discussed her process of the instillation and how one is always focused on finishing it but when you step back you notice things that were not planned. She discussed the path or sequence that would be most logical for an observer to take, however; there are several entrances to the exhibit making the instillation different depending on the sequence followed. There is also unaccountable light shining in from the sun and from different people walking past. She commented on how similar to her professor Al Held, she uses a lot of geometry and torquing of space which I found interesting. As a math major I find her use of math and physics very appealing and striking.

Usually her art is purely designed for the architecture or a romance about being Chinese, but this piece was deeply emotional directly related to her loss and more about choices such as black and white, life and death, good and bad and the impact of that. I also agree with the idea that people judge art the second they see it and if they do not like it, they will move on to the next exhibit. This is true and that is part of what makes art interesting. People have different tastes but if someone likes an instillation they will walk around and really try and understand it.

Judy Pfaff does not use one singular piece of material, rather a variety. She feels that there is a signature style, like handwriting and that anyone who truly liked her work would recognize it was hers regardless of the materials. in "Buckets of Rain" Pfaff used, wood, steel, wax, plaster, fluorescent lights, paint, black foil, expanding foam, and tape. She enjoys using different materials, starting off with aluminum foil when she had little money, to usually different tools and materials. I find her work very interesting and I love her use of geometry and different materials. Pfaff feels that play is important because that is where children’s creativity comes from which will later affect your artwork. When she was 12 she moved from Cockney London to America and she did not fit in. although she does not feel this way anymore her past is still present in her artwork along with her future. Her art displays both who she is and who she wants to be and her instillations are truly wonderful.

My Interpretation of: Against Interpretation by Susan Sontag

To begin, I felt that this article was a tough read and many of her comments about art I did not understand or I feel I do not know enough about art to comprehend. However, I do feel that her article was interesting and I was able to grasp some key points that I feel she was trying to portray.
Susan Sontag first talks about Plato and Aristotle giving their opinions about art. For Plato, “art is neither particularly useful, nor, in the strict sense true”. He considers art to mimetic objects and that even the best painting would be an imitation of an imitation. Aristotle feels that art has a central value and arouses dangerous emotions. Sontag then discusses interpretation and how when dealing with art, it meaning plucking a set of elements from the whole artwork. It basically is a translation. She feels that modern interpretation digs deeper then text and excavates meaning that intentional or not. I liked her example discussing Marienbad’s painting. She argues that the desire to interpret her art should be resisted; rather, what matters “is the pure, untranslatable, sensuous immediacy of some of its images, and its rigorous if narrow solutions to certain problems of cinematic form”.
A couple of definitions that I have learned from this article were abstract paintings and Pop Art. Abstract painting is the attempt to have no content meaning there can be no interpretation. Contrarily, Pop Art uses content so blatant making it interpretable. I also agree that more attention needs to be paid to the formation of art, not the interpretation. A descriptive, rather than prescriptive vocabulary for form is needed. Redundancy is what Susan Sontag feels is taking over modern life and is worried that we are too often assimilating Art into Thought or Art into Culture. She argues that we need to cut back content so that we can see the thing at all. We should be making works of art that are real to us and unique to us.

Against Interpretation - Dillusion

First I would like to willingly admit that this was a difficult read and some of it went over my head and other parts way over. However to from what I did gather Susan Songtag is sick and tired of art being overrun with utter nonsense that distracts us from the real "thing."

She gives a bunch of background information on how art has been believed and used within interpretation all the way back to Plato's and Aristotle's day. She quotes Plato “imitation of an imitation.” This seems pretty point on when we see a film or work of art nowadays. For example Damien Hirst's Shark. His formaldehyde creation of a dead sea creature. Strange? Yes. Controversial? Definitely. Exciting and Revolutionary for some? I would agree. However, if your daring, by what he has done could even throw a third "imitation" in Plato's saying.

She also has a problem with artists and others constantly digging and digging among art. With their, "refusal to leave the work of art alone." She makes her argument that we want to hammer and chip at a work of art because we are nervous of its capacity that we feel at ease with the interpretation of it. If I have hit on this point correctly, I would say that I agree with this notion. Simple art that lets you just wander your mind without convoluted thoughts of such nonsenses is much more true art.